


Cure

by HariWrites



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Character Death, Coma, F/M, Feels, Hospitalization, Hurt/Comfort, Inspired by Chat Blanc, Ladrien | Adrien Agreste/Marinette Dupain-Cheng as Ladybug, Ladynoir | Adrien Agreste as Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng as Ladybug, Major Character Injury, No Spoilers, Post-Canon, Supportive Adrien, mild season 3 spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-09
Updated: 2019-11-13
Packaged: 2021-01-26 10:54:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21372985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HariWrites/pseuds/HariWrites
Summary: Cure, verb: 1. To heal, to make well. 2. To solve a problem. 3. To preserve.Marinette wakes up in the hospital with a head injury and a hazy memory. Adrien is there and he's the only one who can help her put the pieces back together.(Inspired by Gabriel in Chat Blanc, but no episode spoilers.)
Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug
Comments: 97
Kudos: 349





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Just in case you all haven't had enough angst yet... 
> 
> All the thanks to MiniMinou for encouraging me to write down the feels <3

She is having a nightmare. The man in purple is bearing down on her. There is pain and fear and everything is blurred and red. His laughter rings in her head and scares her. She wants to wake up, needs to get away from this man, but she continues to sleep. The blue woman is there now and her twisted smile haunts her. 

_ Wake up! Wake up! _

Her eyelids flicker a few times before her eyes open, blinking and squinting in the harsh strip lighting. As she takes in her surroundings, she feels confusion and fear and she opens her mouth to cry out. Something is blocking her throat, muting her voice and she reaches up to tug at it when strong hands grasp hers.

Faces hover over hers. One shines a light in her eyes, another tells her to cough as The Thing is removed from her throat.  _ “You had an accident.” “Lucky to be alive.” “In a coma.”  _ Unfamiliar voices speak and ask her questions: What year is it? What is her name? She croaks her answers, unsure if the voices are listening.

“Mrs Cheng! Mr Dupain! She’s awake!” A familiar voice calls out from behind a curtain.

Footsteps squeak on linoleum. 

Chaos in hushed tones happens around her and she tries to ask where she is and what happened to her, but nobody can hear her. 

The blonde boy, the one whose voice she thinks she knows, holds her hand and smiles tenderly. “I was so worried about you. I’m sorry.”

“Wha- -appened?” She manages to say.

_ There had been a man in purple and a woman in glass. She remembered that. There were screams and pain. The world became hazy. Then an angel, dressed in black leather scooped her up and ran faster than she’d ever gone. After that, nothing. _

She raises a hand to her head, feeling a bandage over one side, she follows it to where her earlobe is torn. 

More figures stand at the door now. A man and a woman. She focuses harder until they come into stark relief. Maman and papa! She reaches a hand out towards them.

“Marinette! We were so worried!” 

“We’re so glad you’re awake!”

_ Marinette. _ That’s her name. There’s something else she was known as, but what? 

_ Lucky Charm! _

“You’ve been in a medically induced coma for two weeks.” A doctor said. “You had a blow to the head and your brain was swollen, we decided to put you into the coma to allow your brain to heal. Memory loss is normal and might well be temporary, but there is likely some period of time surrounding the accident that you will never recall. Fortunately, Adrien here was nearby when you fell and he brought you into the emergency room. He saved your life.”

_ He does that a lot. He saves my life. _

“You need to rest. There will be a lot more tests to see how well you’re doing, we’ll schedule a visit from a physiotherapist to help get you moving again and a psychologist will come and give you some tips on how to deal with snippets of your memory coming back. I don’t want to worry you, but some of it might be traumatic.”

Adrien. The doctor says he never left. He looks worn and exhausted. She wants to ask him more questions. 

Maman strokes her hair. “Chérie, you were mugged. There was an attack in the street and you must have been pushed over and hit your head on the pavement. You had cuts on your hands and bruises on your arms and legs. You defended yourself.” 

Marinette knows that’s not the real story so Adrien knows otherwise, too. It was the purple man. Chat Noir brought her here in his arms. She remembers the concern in those green eyes before the darkness took over. Before she was trapped inside her nightmare.

_ Chat Noir. Ladybug.  _

“Adrien?” She calls out for him. The only one who can tell her the truth.

“I’m here,” he says. “I’m still here.”

“Stay with me. I need you.”

He nods. He’s not leaving her, she knows. He’ll protect her with every ounce of strength he has and she will defend him with her life. He is her partner.

_Hawk Moth._ _The purple man. She was in his lair. That’s where the woman in glass was. She was sleeping, like Marinette had been, only without the wires and tubes and doctors. Did she have nightmares, too?_

The doctors and nurses come in and out of the room, checking charts and machines, changing bags of various liquids that are being pushed into her body. They take her pulse, her temperature, look in her eyes and ask her to follow the end of their finger. They ask more questions. Who is the President? What school does she attend? It’s too much, too many people. She wants them to go away. She’s tired.

Finally, they leave. They wish to speak to her parents. Adrien stays.

“My earrings?” She touches her ragged earlobe again.

“They’re safe. Master Fu has them. He brought Tikki to visit a couple of times.”

_ Tikki.  _ That name means something. At its mention, a warmth spreads through her, emboldening her. Another name sits on the tip of her tongue and she tries it aloud.

“Chat Noir?”

“I’m here. I’m not leaving your side until I know you’re okay,” the blonde boy says.

His face is concerned but soft and she reaches out to stroke his cheek. His eyes close at her touch. “I love you, don’t I?”

New tears fill his eyes and he gives her a watery smile. Her own cheeks feel wet and he wipes her tears away. 

“I love you, my lady.” 

“Hawk Moth,” she says. “He did this, didn’t he?”

“My father,” the boy sobs. “He did this.”

Yes. Hawk Moth’s lair is in the Agreste mansion, Hawk Moth is Gabriel. Chat Noir is Adrien and his father is Hawk Moth. She reaches out to him.

“I’m sorry.”

“Why? You did nothing wrong.”

“Your father. How are you coping?”

His smile is forced, his eyes are indifferent. “I’m not. I just want you to get better. I’ll worry about him another time.”

She sinks into her pillows and tears flow as sobs wrack her body. Her throat hurts and her eyes sting. She’s not crying for herself now, but for Adrien. While she slept, he has been living his nightmare for real. She found his mother but in the worst possible circumstances. He has no closure, only more pain.

There’s something else. Rocks, broken glass, crying. She remembers now, or rather, _ doesn’t  _ and panic surges through her. She tries to stand up but her muscles are weak and there are tubes everywhere, holding her down.

“Marinette, please rest. I’m only worried about you right now.”

_ Tikki, spots on!  _

She grasps his hands with all her might, he needs to understand. “Adrien! My Lucky Charm! I didn’t cast the Miraculous Cure.”


	2. Chapter 2

The day Plagg arrived in his life changed everything. Suddenly, Adrien found freedom. More freedom than he imagined possible. He found a confidante. A stinky, crotchety confidante, admittedly, but one who was there for him more than anyone else in his life. All at once, being Gabriel Agreste’s son became more bearable. 

The expectations persisted, the hard work continued, the lack of free time compounded, yet, Adrien was happier than ever before. The crushing loneliness he felt after his mother’s disappearance was swept away and replaced with friendship. These days, Adrien was hardly alone and that was exactly how he wanted it to stay. 

He still missed his mother, of course. He still hoped that she would return one day. The circumstances around her disappearance were sketchy; Gabriel chose to shield him from that. Now that he was Chat Noir, Destruction and Chaos, he had the power and strength to find out for himself. There was one person he knew would help him but it required him to divulge something of himself to her that he didn’t like to talk about. He could ask her on Adrien’s behalf, he guessed. It was weird when he was Adrien, but what choice did he have?

“My Lady? This is an unusual request, but I need your help.”

“What’s up, kitty?”

He took a deep breath to steady his nerves. This was more difficult than he expected. “I need to find a missing person. Have you heard about Emilie Agreste?”

Her head snapped up, eyes locked with his. “Adrien’s mother?”

He nodded slowly, considering his next move. If Ladybug ever guessed who he was under the mask, his friendships and freedom were over. “Yes. What do you know about her disappearance?”

“Not much. Only what A— uh, people have talked about. She was on a trip and never came back. Why?”

“Oh, I met Adrien and he, um, asked if I could look into it. If we could look into it, you and I.”

“Adrien asked us?” Her cheeks matched the shade of her suit. “Well, I’m sure we could look into it. Has he asked his father?”

“My fa— Gabriel isn’t forthcoming on the subject. I, uh Adrien has tried.”

“Hmmmm,” she mused. Her lips pursed together, pushing the blood from them. He resisted the urge to kiss them.

“It’s tricky, I know,” he admitted. “And, uh, I don’t think we can talk to Adrien about it too much. His father doesn’t like visitors to the house.”

Ladybug made noise that sounded like a scoff and humph. A scumph. She didn’t hold Gabriel in high esteem, it seemed. “Poor Adrien, he hardly gets to spend time with his friends outside of school… I, erm, I heard from… Someone told me.”

Something warm spread from the pit of his stomach to his chest. Ladybug had asked people about Adrien? Who? “State your sources.”

“I can’t. If I tell you, I might give away details about my life and you know we can’t do that.”

That warm feeling made him feel a little reckless. “Maybe you  _ could _ go speak to Adrien? Just one time.”

She nodded, thoughtful. “Okay, I’ll pay him a visit tomorrow night.”

Chat Noir’s heart soared.

⋇⋆✦⋆⋇

The following night, he paced the carpet in front of his window for an hour. Plagg grew bored of waiting and boarded himself into his cheese cupboard. Adrien didn’t know what time she was likely to arrive but he figured she wanted to let it get dark and wait until most of the staff had gone home. 

He saw her on the roof of the opposite building. Ladybug. She was watching the mansion for signs of life. His father was a night owl but he always locked himself in his atelier in the evenings, and Nathalie’s office was at the front of the house so nobody would see her. He waved.

His heart leapt in his chest as she tossed her yo-yo towards the house and swung towards him. He wiped his sweaty palms on his jeans and tried to act natural. He did this for a living, why had his face forgotten how to smile?

“Hi,” she said, shyly. He was used to a more confident Ladybug, this felt strange. Perhaps she was more comfortable with her partner than Adrien, or maybe the situation was strange to her, too. As far as he knew, she didn’t make house calls on a regular basis.

“Hey, thanks for coming. Can I, uh, get you anything?” 

She shook her head, blushing a little. He sat on his couch and gestured for her to join him. After a pause, she did.

“Chat Noir said you wanted help?”

“Yes, my mother. She disappeared and nobody will tell me what happened. I… I want to move on, heal, but without knowing what happened…” He trailed off. Putting this into words was harder than he expected.

Her hand touched his and every inch of skin tingled in excitement. “It’s okay. I understand.”

“Thanks.”

“I… I actually started with a little research. I hope you don’t mind?” Ladybug pointed to a notebook. He hadn’t noticed until now she was carrying anything.

“How?”

“The library has copies of every newspaper published. I went back through the issues from the time your mother went missing. I, uh, found out something.” She stroked the cover of the notebook and Adrien wondered why she was so reluctant to share her findings. “It might be upsetting.”

“Ah.”

She winced. “I know you want to know what happened, but are you ready for the truth?”

He was ready. From the moment his father and Nathalie started keeping things from him, he knew there was more to his mother’s disappearance. He already knew there would be some ugly truths to learn, if anyone was going to tell him, he was glad it was Ladybug. “Tell me.”

“Okay,” she said and flipped open her notebook. The writing was neat and swooping. Familiar. “According to reports, Gabriel and Emilie left together on their trip to China, but there was nothing to indicate that they ever actually went there. There are reports of a massive avalanche in the mountains of Tibet at around the same time.”

Wheels whirred in his mind. Muttered conversations replayed. “Tibet? Are you sure?”

“There’s something you don’t know about your father. Do you remember the book that went missing? The one he blamed you for losing?”

He nodded. The book contained images of Miraculous holders. “I remember. Someone returned it.”

“Well, it’s a Grimoire and it came from Tibet. It contains information about the Miraculous, the jewels that give me and Chat Noir our powers. There was a fire that destroyed a temple and one of the young guardians was able to rescue it and the Miraculouses. Unfortunately, as he escaped, he lost the Grimoire and two Miraculouses.”

“What does this have to do with my mother?” Adrien asked.

“Well, this is where I move into educated speculation. The avalanche might have unearthed the book. I believe your parents discovered it.”

He remembered the inside of the safe, pictured Plagg sitting inside it. Next to him was a brooch shaped like…”What Miraculouses went missing?”

“It was the Peacock and the Butterfly. If your father has the book, it tracks that he has the missing Miraculous too.”

Adrien was stunned, but not surprised. Not anymore. “He does. I think I saw it.”

Ladybug nodded solemnly. “There’s more. Gabriel didn’t file a missing person’s report until he returned to France, but Emilie Agreste did not reenter the country with him.”

“I knew that.” His father claimed they got split up and he came back to Paris to ensure that Adrien was okay.

“Adrien,” she held his hand now, squeezing it. “There was paperwork. Receipts. Gabriel paid to transport a body from Xining Airport to Charles de Gaulle, but he never filed repatriation paperwork.”

He was falling. The room spun and lurched. As soon as he thought he had found his bearings, the thought came over him like a wave and the spinning started again. Nausea surged and he was sure he would be sick. His mother wasn’t missing.

“What happened next?”

“Nothing. No private funeral, no hospital admissions. The only person who knows is your father.”

“And you think he has the Butterfly Miraculous?” He asked as the room continued to sway.

“The power of the Ladybug and Black Cat combined can grant the bearer one wish. The consequences of using it are catastrophic and don’t bear thinking about.”

“So, my father is using the Butterfly brooch to get hold of them, to save my mother?”

“I think so,” Ladybug said.

“Son of a bitch,” Adrien exclaimed.


	3. Chapter 3

The physiotherapist frowns. She says there is a crackle in Marinette’s lungs. 

“It’s common when you’ve been inactive,” she says.

Marinette doesn’t know why but this makes her feel indignant. ‘Inactive’ makes it seem like she’s been sitting on the couch doing nothing for two weeks, not heavily anaesthetised, in a coma. She has to take deep breaths and cough to clear the fluid from her lungs. Adrien assures the physiotherapist that he’ll ensure she does it regularly. 

She looks at him. Properly for the first time since she opened her eyes, and she sees him. He’s exhausted. Blue shadows under his eyes fade into greyish skin. Patches of reddish bristles grow on his lip and chin, an incomplete 5 o’clock shadow. His hair is wild and a touch greasy. She wants him to stay with her but can see how much he needs to take care of himself.

“Adrien,” she says, grasping his hand. “You need to sleep and shower somewhere comfortable. Go home.”

She winces. She didn’t mean to say that. Didn’t mean to remind him of that place.

_ She sees his reflection in the glass coffin. He is the picture of grief and shock and she wants to hold him. She wants to make the pain go away. Another face appears in the glass, sneering. “Get away from my wife.” _

He shakes his head. “No. I’m not leaving you.”

He keeps saying that and she’s starting to believe he means it. After everything that happened, everything that went down, she wants to keep him close too. She’s worried about him. 

_ “Cataclysm.” He crushed the butterfly in his fist and it turned into dust. Hawk Moth laughed and conjured another. Chat Noir summoned his Cataclysm again. She gasped as his hand fizzed once more with the power of destruction.  _

“Call Alya and ask her to sit with me, or wait until maman and papa close the bakery tonight and go there. You’ll feel better after a proper wash. More human.” She wishes she could shower. Sponge baths are not sufficient. 

“I’m fine.” He shakes his head again. This time, less resolutely.

_ Her own scream echoed inside her head. His laughter drowned it out. The other one, the blue woman goaded them, mocked them for their weakness. She felt her transformation fade and strength drained from her body. A cry cut the air, powerful, vengeful. The world turned to darkness. _

She needs to get well enough to leave this place. To be strong enough to get her Miraculous back and transform. She must cast the cure. For Chat’s sake as much as anyone else’s. 

Marinette strokes his face, feeling the rough stubble on smooth skin. She is tired. The short session with the physio has worn her out. The hourly observations through the night don’t help. The emotions of having survived this ordeal keep overwhelming her. She wants to sleep and she wants to cry. Adrien places a gentle kiss on her forehead.

Such tenderness. Such power.

She lies back against the pillows. Adrien strokes the back of her hand. Those fingertips hold the power of destruction but they are healing her. Her black cat is her good luck charm. Tears flow, she can’t stop them and she doesn’t care. After holding them in for so long, it’s good to let them come. Adrien sees her and he cries too. So much has changed so many things are broken but they are complete in each other.

She wonders if he is afraid like she is. When she casts the Miraculous cure, what will change? Will they change? Will Marinette and Adrien, Ladybug and Chat Noir return to how they were before their encounter with Hawk Moth? What will they remember? If she had a choice, she would choose to never release the swarm of magical ladybugs, to leave things as they are now. 

She must, though. Without it, her body will heal. Adrien’s heart might not. She will do it for him. She loves him and he loves her, not even the most powerful magic will change that, surely?


	4. Chapter 4

He was running for hours before she caught up with him. In his room, the walls were closing in and he needed to clear his head. When his Lady placed a hand on his shoulder, he jumped and spun around, ready to attack.

“It’s me! Retract the claws.” Her hands were up, palms out. Defensive.

He put his hand to his heart, feeling the thumping beneath his suit. It was the only thing that reminded him he was alive. His father was Hawk Moth, his mother was not missing. Part of him died when Ladybug broke the news to him. “Sorry, you took me by surprise.”

She smiled and tilted her head. “I guess Adrien filled you in on everything? I’m sorry I didn’t involve you in the research, kitty. I had a source that I need to protect.”

He laughed. “I’m not mad at you. I’m mad at me.” She frowned. “You suspected Gabriel Agreste and I didn’t believe you. I should have trusted your word.”

“Chat, I had no real proof then. This time, we do. This is how we correct our mistakes. For Adrien, okay?”

“Okay.” Every time she spoke his real name, something fluttered inside his chest and made him feel brave.

They ran in silence, neither one willing to admit their trepidation at running towards Hawk Moth’s lair. They knew this would be dangerous, knew this was their toughest fight yet. This was their chance to end Hawk Moth’s reign of terror once and for all, but it could be the end for them, too. For him, it was personal, and that thought drove his legs forward even when fear tried to stall him. Ladybug had no selfish vendetta, but she was a hero and she would face down their nemesis for all of Paris. 

As agreed, he had left his window ajar and they entered the house through his bedroom. It felt alien to sneak through the corridors of the mansion in his superhero guise. When they pushed open the door to Gabriel’s atelier, he expected his father to be inside. That was where he claimed to be every evening, after all. 

It was empty.

He led Ladybug to the portrait of his mother. “This is where Adrien said the safe was hidden.”

She examined it, her eyes darting quickly across the surface. Adrien gazed at the image of his mother and considered a simpler time, before he knew of her fate, before he learned that his father was an evil mastermind who akumatised his friends and tried to kill him on numerous occasions. Fury bubbled through his veins. He had to conquer that, make it work for him, not Hawk Moth.

“Chat! Look!” Ladybug ran her fingers over the surface and he saw them. Indentations in the painting. Buttons.

He placed his fingers over them and pushed. The floor dropped, taking them downwards into the basement of the mansion. When they stopped moving, his heart and stomach continued their descent. 

A long industrial bridge led across a stretch of water to a small garden. In the centre… 

... It looked like a sarcophagus.

Not as ornate as the ones in the Louvre, but this was unmistakably a tomb. His feet carried him to it while the rest of his body urged him to run. Bile rose and he had to swallow hard to suppress the sick feeling. His mother was in there, he knew it. Close behind him, Ladybug had her hand on her hip, ready to grab her yo-yo should the moment demand it. That was when he realised, he had dropped all his defences.

“Is this her?” Ladybug whispered. 

“It must be,” he said. His voice was hushed, strangled by dread.

“What’s this?” Ladybug touched something on the edge of the tomb and the outer shell slid open. 

_ Maman.  _

His lungs gave up their oxygen. His mother looked so peaceful, so perfect. This was where his father spent all his time. Instead of consoling his grieving son, he stayed here, hidden with the body of his wife. Was she alive? If she was dead, why was Gabriel keeping her here instead of letting her rest in peace? 

That spinning sensation again. Ladybug was right, Gabriel planned to use the Miraculouses to bring her back. Without a second thought of the consequences, without a care for who he hurt in the process. Even his own son.

“Get away from my wife.” 

Hawk Moth had snuck up behind them while he was enthralled by the sight of his mother. Ladybug’s yo-yo spun by her side and he reached for his staff. Hawk Moth looked angry and cornered; a dangerous combination.

Chat snarled, a hiss rose from his throat. “No, you get away from my mother.”

Ladybug gasped. Hawk Moth stumbled backwards, shocked, but he quickly recovered. The smile he wore was a sneer. “Adrien? Of course. Give me your Miraculous and we can bring her back, together.”

_ “The power of the Ladybug and Black Cat combined can grant the bearer one wish. The consequences of using it are catastrophic and don’t bear thinking about.” _

“We haven’t done anything ‘together’ since maman was here. Why do you think I’d do  _ this _ with you?”

“To bring back your mother.” Every word dripped with condescension. Even when he needed Adrien’s compliance, Gabriel couldn’t ask nicely.

“I let go, I grieved for her. Alone. I’m not helping you.”

A growl echoed against the cavernous walls. Hawk Moth was furious and Adrien was enjoying it. That was when he saw it, the butterfly. “You will help me, Adrien, whether you choose to or not.”

“Cataclysm.” He caught the butterfly and crushed it in his hand. Ladybug called her Lucky Charm, expecting the timer on his transformation to begin.

Hawk Moth let out a mocking laugh and sent another butterfly towards him. Adrien channelled all of his fury into his hand. “Cataclysm.” The second butterfly turned to dust.

Beside him, Ladybug squeaked in amazement. They both knew it was possible to use their powers without having to recharge. Tonight, he had used his rage and focused it, achieving his full potential. Chat didn’t look at her. He continued to stare down his father as power surged into his hand again. 

Ladybug cried out in warning, but it was too late. A blow from behind brought him to his knees. Tackled while his attention was on Hawk Moth, he tried to spring to his feet. She knocked him backwards, bearing down on him. Mayura. He couldn’t bring himself to use his Cataclysm on her. Surely, she was in his father’s thrall, she wasn’t to blame. 

“Give me your Miraculous and I’ll get you to safety.” He could help her. He could get  _ someone _ out of this hell. “He won’t be able to hurt you any more.”

“I chose this. I knew Emilie was here,” she spat, unrepentant.

“No!” He kicked out and she deflected him, laughing. 

“If you weren’t so weak, you’d help your father, too.”

_ Weak.  _ As they fought, he saw her strength wane. The longer they battled, the weaker she became. The Peacock. If it was damaged, it could have killed his mother. Nathalie was willing to do the same for Gabriel－Gabriel was willing to let another woman suffer for his plans. Chat aimed his staff at her legs and she fell. A flash of terror dissolved into disdain in her eyes as he reached for the brooch. 

“And to think, I trusted you. You two deserve each other.” He cast a glance behind him where Hawk Moth was struggling with Ladybug. He had the upper hand physically, but Ladybug was wily.

Nathalie let out a stomach-turning wail as her transformation lifted. She convulsed with coughs, too frail to lift herself from the ground. With one final wheeze, she was still. The broken Miraculous had drained her of her health; she had sacrificed herself for Gabriel. 

The wrath that rose up inside him was unbearable. Indignation for another pawn in Gabriel’s sick game. Another woman destroyed by her devotion to him.

The scream that rang through the air broke him. 

He turned to the source. Blood trickled from Ladybug’s head and dripped from Hawk Moth’s fist. Her transformation was starting to dissolve. A familiar pigtail and jacket were fading into view. Chat’s heart raced. Hawk Moth had ripped the earring from her ear and thrown her to the ground. His boot was poised over her skull, ready to deliver the final blow. 

Chat acted on instinct. The roar that emitted from his chest was from deep within a primal part of him. He pushed his hand to the ground and released every ounce of fear and grief and anger into the power that surged from him. 

The floor shook and the walls crumbled. Chat ran at Hawk Moth, knocking him down and wresting the earring from his hand. As the ceiling caved in above them, he grabbed his Lady and fled. Behind him, a sickening, creaking explosion sounded as the Agreste mansion dropped into its foundations, crushing his father, mother and Nathalie under it.


	5. Chapter 5

Marinette keeps turning it over in her hands, the Lucky Charm. She has to be transformed for it to work, Master Fu says. She thinks she’s ready. She is able to walk to the stairs without having to sit down and this morning, she climbed to the landing without help. The doctors smile when they visit her room and the nurses have stopped taking her vitals so often. Her strength is coming back.

Alya and Nino visit every evening after school, bringing cards and notes for Marinette, coursework for Adrien. After they leave, Marinette and Adrien do the work together. She doesn’t want to fall behind the rest of the class. Maman and Papa bring them breakfast every morning and fuss over Adrien, telling him he is welcome at their apartment whenever he wants. They are talking about converting the office into a bedroom for him. They have given up on Ladybug’s cure.

“I’ll be ready soon,” she says. 

Adrien’s face falls and his thumb touches the place his ring once rested. He’s worried about her. Does he think she’s not strong enough? Fu assured them that the cure will still work, even after this amount of time. She knows she can do it, why doesn’t Adrien believe in her?

“My Lady.” He reaches out and takes the object from her, placing it gently on the table. “We need to talk about this.”

“Adrien, please. I can do this.”

She doesn’t understand what more there is to discuss. They know the cure will restore everything. It will rebuild the house, revive Gabriel and Nathalie, repair Emilie’s broken tomb. They can ask Master Fu to help fix Adrien’s mother and everyone can be happy. She wants to fix it for Adrien.

He squeezes her hands. “I know you can. I never doubted that.”

She can give him back his family. That is what has driven her recovery, her desire to make his life better. “So wha-”

He cuts her off with a kiss, then presses his forehead to hers. “He was going to kill you. I can’t put you in that kind of danger again.”

Suddenly, she understands.

The last of her bruises have faded to yellowish-brown, her cuts have healed into shiny new skin. Her scars will become part of her, mostly forgotten. His wounds are emotional; his father caused them. Sustained, constant, insidious. His scars will haunt him every day.

He doesn’t want her to cast the cure. 

“All my life, I’ve been imprisoned. Homeschooled, on a strict schedule, not allowed friends. Even before my mother’s ‘disappearance’, I was a prisoner. It got worse afterwards. Then, it got better.”

“Plagg,” she says.

He nods. “I was free.”

She frowns. “But…” 

“Tom and Sabine questioned where you went when you were Ladybug. I know they grounded you for your absences, didn’t they? They noticed that something was different, even if they didn’t know what. My father noticed I was missing once.”

She sits up in bed, looking him in the eye. “I didn’t know, I’m sorry.”

“I learned to hide it. I lost my mother years ago, but I also lost my father. His obsession with bringing her back was why he neglected every other part of his life, including me. Without my Miraculous, I would have wasted away in that mansion and he wouldn’t have noticed.”

A sob chokes his words and Marinette wraps her arms around him. She feels his pain acutely. She saw the horror on his face when they discovered his mother. Saw the loss in his eyes when his father confirmed his plan. She was there. She alone understands what he went through. With Gabriel gone, Adrien’s nightmare is over. Emilie’s, too. 

That’s when she knows what they must do. 

Wayzz and Plagg have retrieved the Butterfly Miraculous from the wreckage, the Miracle Box now contains a full set. Hawk Moth has been defeated. Adrien’s ordeal is finally over. If she restores everything, she is condemning him to a lifetime of misery.

She reaches out for the Lucky Charm and places it on the bed between them. The red hue of the leaf is as vibrant and the day she conjured it. Instead of becoming dry and brittle over time, it looks like an autumn leaf that has just fluttered off a tree. “Maybe this isn’t a cure like we usually cast. I think this is symbolic of something else.”

Adrien smiles, and for the first time since her eyes flickered open, he looks truly happy.

That’s why their first stop when the doctors finally discharge her from the hospital is Pont d’Arcole. They have an arm each around each other as they face the Seine, watching it glitter and flow through the city. The leaf is held between them.

“The past is behind us,” Marinette says.

“It’s time to move on,” Adrien adds.

“Together.”

“It’s time to let go.”

And they do. As the leaf flutters towards the water, they walk, hand in hand, away from their past. Ready to face the future together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no regrets.
> 
> Thank you for reading, your comments and kudos give me life and I adore every one of them <3 Special thanks to [MiniMinou](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MiniMinou/pseuds/MiniMinou) for enabling my angst and beta reading for me. She's awesome, but y'all already know that.


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